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Most French policiers and indeed most English language crime fiction novels feature police or detectives pitted against criminals and killers, but we know that the police have to deal with far more than that in their line of work, and the nature of crime in the modern world is changing rapidly. In Paris alone there have been many serious real world challenges faced by the PJ ( Police Judiciaire ) and emergency services in recent years from terrorist attacks but all of that is just pointing to a larger scale issue that is approached in Christophe Molmy's Brûlez tout ("Burn Everything"), a novel which has been awarded the 2026 Prix du Quai des Orfèvres. The success and the significant mark that Brûlez tout makes is in how it turns its attention not just to rather more contemporary issues, but how it looks behind the front page headlines and considers some of the underlying issues that have the potential - the extreme likelihood rather - of occurring again in the future. ...

Promising great variety and an exploration of all sides of crime and Italian society, Augusto De Angelis' third Commissario De Vincenzi thriller, written in 1936, has different challenges for the commissioner and as such takes on a different tone from Il banchiere assassinato and Sei donne e un libro . It's in a different social milieu and, as such, he has to adapt his usual investigatory approach. De Vincenzi still prefers the psychological examination of witnesses and suspects, but rather than coming to the scene and attempting to track back to find a killer, he is very much involved in an ongoing investigation. At first however it's a case of arriving at a crime scene and getting a sense of the environment he is working in. It's at a book fair which, as an avid reader, is not unknown to him, but the victim of strangulation found in one of the booths has an unusual background. Giobbe Tuama is of American Irish background (Giobbe is the Italian for 'Job' in th...

The second Commissioner De Vincenzo novel by Augusto De Angelis again deals with crime that takes place not on the lower levels of society, but involving those in seemingly more respectable positions. It might be such subjects that made the author unpopular with the authorities - if you can call being arrested, interrogated and beaten to such an extent that it led to his death as being 'unpopular'. The very fact of writing crime novels and thereby showing an ugly side to Italian society was however enough to be deemed 'anti-fascist'. Unlike the Agatha Christie-like staged first De Vincenzi investigation Il banchiere assassinato , written in 1935, De Angelis here gives the evidence-first Milan police commissioner rather a more challenging situation with a larger group of people to come up with motive for murder, which makes even investigating or finding a suspect even harder. The nature of the murder that begins the investigation into Sei donne e un libro  ('Six Wome...

I wouldn't say that he works to a formula, but there are a number of familiar Franck Thilliez features evident at the start of his third novel Deuils de miel , published in 2006 following the Sharko debut Train d'enfer pour ange rouge and the Lucie Henebelle debut La chambre des morts . Aside from Sharko's dark brooding violence, to be expected after Train d’enfer pour ange rouge , there is the discovery of the body of a naked dead woman in an elaborately staged scene in a church confessional. Like another exchange that I referred to in the later novel Atom[ka] indicating the way ahead for a disturbing case, Sharko observes early on here that " en est parti pour une longue et macabre affaire ". Knowing Thilliez that will certainly be backed up, but it's already evident in the bizarre nature of the opening scene. Found dead and naked in a church confessional is the least of it. The victim here has had live butterflies stuck to her shaved head, and indeed all ...

For a short standalone story, Lisa Unger manages to pack a lot into the 70 pages of this crime thriller about Paige, a hit woman working for a shadowy organisation she knows only as "the Company". The story opens with her failing an assignment to kill a wealthy man, a hedge fund manager. It should have been an easy job, all the ground work and preparations taken care of in order to be able to slip into his house undetected, but at the last minute she is interrupted by the man's child who was not expected to be there. Nora, her boss, is not happy. She thinks that Paige might be losing her edge, softening, but maybe Paige has other things on her mind like the troubling nuisance calls she is receiving from her ex, Julian, also a hit man for the organisation and a cryptic message that could be a threat or a warning. Or maybe she has taken her eye off the ball while involved with the young new recruit, Drake, she is mentoring and sleeping with. Or both. Either way, when Nora i...

Post-apocalyptic stories were concerning enough before the COVID pandemic. La terra dei figli ('The Land of the Children') was written and drawn by Gipi in 2016, and reading it now that we have all became aware of the reality of what could happen and how quickly a virus could spread across the globe, it’s surprising how effectively his story captures the whole sense of fear that comes with the recognition that things have changed irrevocably. What makes it even more concerning is the realisation that even having come though such a global shock is the apparent inability of humanity to learn from its mistakes. All of this just makes La terra dei figli even more ominous. In Gipi’s graphic novel, the old world is long gone or, considering how quickly a global catastrophe can strike happen, perhaps not that long gone, but definitely gone. The initial impression Gipi gives us of this world is a rather bleak and feral one. We are introduced to two youths in an unpopulated savannah l...

You don't need to think too hard to figure out that a semi-autobiography by an artist called My Badly Drawn Life has a fair degree of self-deprecation. And bad drawings. The intention, from the random manner that the stories in the book are related, is almost as if Gipi feels embarrassed to give the stories and his life the respectability of beautiful drawings. Although unconventional, he is certainly capable of that - and there are examples of that in the book, mostly in the colour sections - but when it comes to speaking about what a dork he was as a youth, he prefers to leave it sketchy and a bit of a mess. Which sums up those events perfectly. Published in English translation by Fantagraphics, its ideal home, the US publisher often publishing international foreign language translations of works equivalent of the Drawn & Quarterly sad sack loser indies of Joe Matt, Julie Doucet and Chester Brown. Written and drawn between 2006 and 2007, what is special about Gipi is (much l...

On the surface, Gipi's artwork might look simple, naïve and even ‘badly drawn’ to use the artist's own term as the title of his unusual semi-autobiographical book My Badly Drawn Life . The subjects too seem simple, often about youths trying to find their place in the world, but there's a conflict here between style and content that is at the heart of his work and his expression. It demands something that shows much more than is evident on the surface and Gipi's artwork and graphic storytelling achieves that in 2005 work,  Garage Band . The subject itself is indeed simple and universal. A group of boys in a remote provincial area decide to put together a band and practice in what a garage temporarily given to them to use by Giuliano's father. In Gipi style, the faces of the boys are rendered in simple childlike lines, but they offer a wealth of character and expression. Partly it's in their behaviour and movements, partly it's in how they contrast with the wa...

If there is one good thing to come out of the Troubles - and I say that as someone who lived through them and finds it hard to see any positive side - it's that the period makes for a great television or movie drama. Or more often a bad one riddled with clichés, to be honest, but even then it provides lucrative work opportunities for local actors, extras and media people. It's sad but it's funny at the same time and Séamas O'Reilly recognises both sides of that equation. It adds up to an entertaining and thoughtful read, one that relies itself on the stereotypes, but with a sense of black humour that has an essence of truth to it. Prestige Drama doesn't try to revive the past, but is more firmly rooted in the industry and the people trying to get something out of it. There's Diarmuid, the writer for 'Dead City', a forthcoming edgy Northern Ireland Troubles TV drama "inspired by real events". He lives in England now of course, but is currently ...

Suspicion is a short work by Seicho Matsumoto, but one characteristically filled with intrigue and potential in how it explores crime and its impact on individuals and society. In one respect it's a familiar subject, a court case, or at least the build-up to a court case that is already causing concern and speculation even before it reaches trail. The accused is believed to be guilty because of her past record and, to be fair, the case against her doesn't look good. Typically however - as noted in Inspector Imanshi Investigates ), Matsumoto considers the wider social context as well as certain cultural issues, but the focus is primarily on the intrigue of the crime mystery. Kumako Onizuka is accused of murdering her husband Mr Shirakawa for insurance and is being defended by a notable lawyer called Harayama. A journalist who has been following and reporting on the case, Akitani, can't understand why the lawyer is bothering himself with such an open and shut case. Onizuka h...